Door and mechanism for opening and closing the same



April 3, 1951 c, PQTTS 2,547,488

DOOR AND MECHANISM FOR OPENING AND CLOSING THE SAME Filed May 3, 1946 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 /NVEN TOR CLYDE Po 77's C- POTTS April 3, 1951 DOOR AND MECHANISM FOR OPENING AND CLOSING THE SAME 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 Filed May 3, 1946 /NVEN7'0R CLYDE P0771;

Patented Apr. 3, 1951 noon AND MECHANISM FOR OPENING AND CLOSING THE SAME Clyde Potts, MorristowrnN. J.; Weston Gavett, Stanley N. Williams, and John D. Collins, 3rd, executors of said Clyde'Potts, deceased Application May 3, 1946, Serial No. 666,997

The invention relates to the construction of doors and opening and closing mechanism for the same, andwhile not limited in its application, is"spe'cially designed and adapted for use, as herein embodied, for closing the entrance C1001? way of small airplane hangars.

v To enable such a door to be opened and closed witha minimum of power, the door is divided lengthwise into two balanced sections, the upper section being hinged to the top of the doorway to swing outward and upward about a horizontal axis and the lower section hinged to the bottom of'the same, to swing outward and downward about aparallel axis. In open position, the upper door section protects the hangar entrance against varying weather conditions and the lower door section ordinarily serves as a ramp to ease theway for an airplane being entered in the hangar.

For opening and closing the door sections, a toggle action, which may be operated by hand but is preferably power-operated, is employed at one or both ends of thedoor sections, the action providing a toggle lever connection to each door section and having the free ends of the levers pivotally connected to a toggle head, which is advanced by. suitable gearing to open the doors and retracted by reversing the gearing, to close thedoors. 1

When the gearing'employed is of a type that l's self-locking or otherwise locked when not in operation, an additional toggle lock is not relimited to movement within the building or on the inner side of the doorway but with gearing that would be thrown into reverse action bythe weightfofan open door, the toggle lock may be employed by extending the advance of the toggle head between and beyond the points of attachment or the toggle levers to the doors, where further advance of the head is checked and it is held against movement in either direction. Reversing the gearing retracts the toggle head, which is drawn from its advanced position and its inward movement is continued until the doors are closed.

As the doors, preferably, are relatively weighted to balance each other, they have no free movement and are dependent in opening and closing upon the action of the gearing, which maybe of anysuitable or well known form.

2 Claims. (Cl. 268-74) Othrifeatures of the invention not specially mentioned above, will be brought to attention in the detailed description that follows.

Several embodiments of the invention are shown in the accompanying drawings but, it will be understood, that no limitations are intended by this showing, other than are imposed by the appended claims.

In the drawings Fig. 1 is a front view in elevation of a hangar. showing the entrance closed by doors constructed in accordance with the present invention.

Fig. 2 is a partial. longitudinal section of the same, taken on the line s s of Fig. 1.

Fig. 3 is a similar view of a modification, and

Fig. 4 is a like view of a further modification.

Referring now to the drawings, l indicates the entrance doorway of a hangar 2, which latter may be of any size and construction desired but is preferably designed to accommodate a single small airplane.

As a floor protection against flooding by a heavy rainfall and the entrance-blocking effect of a heavy snowfall, the floor is ra sed about a foot above the ground level. To bridge the gap between the floor and ground, the concrete foundation is extended forward in the form of blocks 3, spaced apart across the front of the building. These blocks present a downwardly inclined surface, reaching from the floor to the ground, and

'serve as supports for the lower section 4 of the entrance door, which comes to rest thereon when in open'position, as indicated in dotted lines in Fig- 2, and serves as a ramp to ease entrance of an airplane into the hangar.

The door closing the entrance to the hangar is divided lengthwise into two sections, the upper section 5 being hinged to the top of the doorway, as indicated at 6, to swing outward and upward about a horizontal aids and the lower section 4, being hinged to the bottom of the doorway, as indicated at l, to swing outward and downward about a parallel axis.

The doors may be of any design and construction desired, the upperoneordinarily being provided with a number of windows 8, to admit light to the interior of the building and for ventilation purposes.

The upper door is preferably of greater height than the lower door and in order to operate them with a minimum amount of power, the lower door is suitably counterweighted to balance the greater weight of the upper door. Thus balanced, they have no independent movement of their own and respond only to the action of the gearing by which they are opened and closed.

A toggle action isemployed foropening and closing the doors and consists of a pivoted toggle lever 9 adjustably connected to each door and a movable toggle head ID, to which the free ends of the levers are pivotally connected. As the adjustable connection of the toggle levers to the doors, shown in Figs. 2 and 4, may be of any suitable or Well known form, it will not be neces-- sary to describe the same in detail The advance and retraction of the'head to'give the levers the required movement to open and close the doors, that is, from the full line to the dotted line position shown in Fig.2, is effected by suitable gearing, which m'ay behand-operated as indicated by the crank H, shown in Fig. 2, or by power, as indicated by the motor 12,-diagrammatically shown in Figs. 5' and '4.

The toggle head in Figs. 2 and 3, is carried by a rack bar it, movable in guides 14, I4, and is engaged by a pinion E5, the rotation of which by hand, as in Fig. 2 or by power, as inAFig. 3, gives motion to the rack Joar to advance and retract -the toggle head. Outward :movement of the rack bar is limited by the lower door -coming to rest on the inclined blocks :3 and toprevent any tendency-of the rack bar to be :moved :rearward by the weight of the upper doorrunder the force of high winds, for example a locking pawl I6, is shown in Fig. 2, which may be thrown in and out of engagement with the pinion 15.

In the-power-driven gearing shown in Fig. 3,.the toggle :head is :advanced by the rack bar between and beyond the points of connectionf the toggle Ievers-to the doors, as indicated in dotted lines, and by'the well known 'toggle action, locks the rack bar against retraction. To prevent furtheradvance of the head by the weight of the upper'door, a stop I! is secured to-the inner end of the rack bar which brings up against the rack bar guide when the rack bar is fully-advanced.

To insure smooth operation, it may be desirable to duplicate a toggle action shown at the opposite end of the doors, as indicated diagrammatically in dotted lines inFig. 1. This could be readily done and operated by means of a cross shaft H3 in a floor pit l9, as shown in Fig. 3.

In themodification shown in Fig.4, the-togg1e head is advanced and retracted by a motordriven screw shaft 20, which isself-locking when not in operation.

To avoid opening the main doors to gain entrance .to the hangar, a smallauxiliary door-(not shown) may be provided in either the main doors or the wall of the building.

For operating the power-driven gearing, re-

4 versible electric motors are preferably employed and control switches 2|, are provided either or both inside and outside the building.

As the construction, operation and many advantages of the invention will be clearly apparent from the foregoing, it will not be necessary to further describe the same.

I claim:

1. A closure for a building entrance opening above the ground level and operating means therefor, comprising a pair of doors of balanced weightiand different height arranged one above the other and hinged at the top and bottom of the entrance :toswing outward in opposite directions about horizontal axes, the upper door being'of greated height than the lower door and whenopen serving as a canopy to protect the entrance against weather conditions and the lower door when open inclining downwardly and resting on the ground as a ramp, a toggle lever connectionto each door,'a toggle headconnecting the levers, gearing for-advancingand'retracting the toggle head to impart opening and 'clos' ing movement to the doors through the toggle lever connections, the toggle head 'beingimovable by said gearing beyond the line of centers'of the toggle lever connections to the-doors :to lock the doors in open position and against accidental closing.

2. A closure for a building entrance and operating means therefor as defined in claim 1 in which the toggle levers and gearing are duplicated and positioned at opposite sides of the doors,'means for connecting the same for-'simul-- taneouscperation and single means "for actuatingsaid connection to thereby simultaneously effect movement of the toggle heads.

' CLYDE POT'IS.

REFERENCES CITED The following references are of record "in the file of this patent:

UNITED STATES PATENTS Number Name .Date

1,426,901 Nelson Aug.- 2,1'922 1,508,270 Connolly Sept. 9, .1924 2,034,445 Robinson Mar. 17, .1936. 2,070,722 Finke Feb. '1 6, .1- 9 37 2,221,039 Babcock Nov..12,1940 2,249,932 Beal July 2, 11 941 2,408,132 Weeks Sept. 24,1946 

